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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24487411">Breath</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/WolvenHighblood/pseuds/WolvenHighblood'>WolvenHighblood</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Vampire: The Masquerade, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines (Video Game)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Depression, F/M, Intrusive Thoughts, Suicidal Thoughts</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 04:13:48</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>991</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24487411</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/WolvenHighblood/pseuds/WolvenHighblood</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Watching as the flames engulf Venture Tower, she realizes that she should be filled with joy and accomplishment. Instead everything just feels numb.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Ash Rivers/Original Lasombra Character(s)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Breath</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>She still doesn’t completely know why she doesn’t remember her time alive. Nines’ running theory is blunt force trauma or dehydration. Beckett said there’s a high correlation between paralysis soon after turning and pre-embrace amnesia.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Though the cause is unknown she knows she was a pawn from the beginning, her life before is meaningless in the grand scheme of things. Just as useless as her Ventrue “sire’s” tongue that had been cut out to keep from revealing to the audience he was set up.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As she stands in front of the burning building that once was Venture tower she feels nothing. Even as she see’s Nines walking towards her, likely to bring her to The Last Round for a celebratory drink, she feels numb. It’s moments like these when she remembers her life. Remembers sitting in her room debating on calling Sam or going down the hall to wake her mother at 2 in the morning while tears run down her face and she lets out silent sobs. She never reached out, only making vague references long after the waves would pass to Samantha. It always ended the same, she’d put on sad music and pace around her living room.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was when she sobbed that she became introspective, when she felt her thoughts were most clear. Debatable, really. Her mind would wander, begin to narrate everything about herself as she was in that very second. She’d become conscious of it and tell herself that if her mind could wander she was being over dramatic. That there was nothing to cause her sadness so it wasn’t real. Couldn’t be real.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>On a few occasions her mind would drift and a little part of her would try to convince her to end it all. She’d entertain the thought, remember about hearing how most women focused on how people would find their body, then wave it away telling herself this was only about attention. In truth, she was scared of ending her own life. She knew she didn’t want to die, but sometimes, for just a moment she did.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She isn’t sad about ending LaCroix’s pathetic existence, it was cathartic and amazing in the moment. But now it feels meaningless. Just as meaningless as her sire—her real sire—would be if he showed up.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Watching the flames she thinks to herself, maybe staying here until sunrise would be so bad.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Angel</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Yeah, maybe she’d finally live up to her name.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Kid</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s what everyone treated her like, even though she left piles of bodies in her wake during the blood hunt.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey. Kid,” Oh when did Nines get so close. “You okay?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She lies easily while her mind tells her that kid is exactly what she is, and she’s just being stupid to entertain that thought again. Probably just for pity anyways.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>If Nines doesn’t believe her words, he doesn’t say anything about it. But his face gives it away. She wonders if everyone knew but just didn’t press the matter, maybe she could have gotten the counselling she wanted. But who is she kidding, her logical thoughts told her this was all for attention anyways, of course she would have given signs she was “upset”. And they knew it was a ploy, they had to have, or they would have brought it up.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s brought out of her thoughts once more by the Nines’ offer of joining the anarchs and she politely declines. Retreating to her shitty bachelor pad in Santa Monica.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When the door creaks open, her childe is there, chatting away with Ash. She had forgotten Mercurio had told her he’d man the fort during the blood hunt, keeping Ash, in his fragile state, safe while she couldn’t.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She ignores the two and make her way to the small bathroom to try to wash these feelings away. She couldn’t but feel she wasn’t worthy of Ash, that she deluded herself into thinking she was when numbness didn’t envelop her. She told herself that because she feigned sadness for attention so often, she knew what to look for. She knew the signs and she knew that he wasn’t faking it, that he wanted an out. That he only “graciously” agreed to live with her because even though he was the depressed one, he pitied her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The creaking of the bathroom door broke her thoughts once more. Footsteps echoed in the small room before finding a comfortable spot and perching.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You okay?” The concern sounded genuine, but her rational mind knew it wasn’t, just the pity and attention she so desperately craved.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His hand presses against the shower curtain, “Come on, you can talk to me. I know what those voices are saying.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>And she believed him, at least for the moment. The screech of shower curtain stops her thoughts from fully forming. And Ash looks over her blotchy face, red from crying, though it was hard to tell how much of it was the shower.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He cups her cheek, and she can't bring herself to meet his eyes. But there's no sigh of frustration, just the press of his lips against her forehead. She lets her eyes close and her post-cry headache set in as he rinses the shampoo from her hair, massaging her scalp in the process. Her eyes opened when his touch left for too long and he hands her a towel. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>A reassuring smile stays on his face, even as she lethargically runs the towel over her body to dry it. Instead he works conditioner slowly through her hair and when finished, waits with her favorite robe.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As they lay on the clearly used and probably mistreated mattress, making plans to order a new one in the morning, and listening to Deb’s soothing voice on the radio, she realizes that, for once, her mind shut up. As the night wanes and the moon begins to fall, she drifts off listening to soft sounds of his artificial breaths.</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Okay so first I wrote and immediately published this, so sorry if some stuff doesn't sound right, it's 2 in the morning. Second, I mostly refrained from using her actual name except for once, because reading other people's names given to the PC breaks immersion for me. Lastly this was written so quickly, because I realized I was essentially narrating my exact thoughts, but projected onto my character so I figured this would be kind of therapeutic for me.<br/>Hope you enjoyed.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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